Memorandum-holder for telephones.



No. 756,470. PATENTED APR.- 5, 1904.

O. G. BYERS.

MEMORANDUM HOLDER FOR TELBPHONES. APPLICATION FILED APR. 17, 1902.

NO MODEL.

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UNifrED STATES Patented April 5, 1904.

PATENT OFFICE.

MEMORANDUM-HOLDER FOR TELEPHONES.

SPECIFICATION forming part of Letters Patent No. 756,470, dated April 5, 1904.

Application filed April 17, 1902.

To all whom it may concern:

Be it known that I, ORIN G. BYERS, a citizen of the United States, residing at Baltimore, in the State of Maryland, have invented certain new and useful Impovernents in Memorandum- Holders for Telephones, of which the following is a specification.

This invention is an improved device to be attached to atelephone, wall, desk, or the like and designed to support a pad or tablet on which memoranda may be written.

The invention consists in certain constructions and combinations of parts hereinafter fully described and claimed, reference being had to the accompanying drawings,in which-- Figure 1 is a face view of a telephone instrument with my improved tablet-holder secured thereto. Fig. 2 is a side edge view of the tablet-holder. Fig. 3 is a bottom or inverted plan view thereof. Fig. 4 is a detail view of the plate intended to be permanently secured to the telephone-case and adapted to receive the bracket-arm of the holder. Fig. 5 is an enlarged detail end view of the clip for the tablet.

Referring to the drawings, the letter A designates a telephone instrument provided with a boX or casing a for signaling mechanism, batteries, or the like, and to either side of said box, in this instance and preferably the right-hand side, is permanently secured a plate 6 (shown in detailin Fig. 4) and provided with a socket b, which in this instance is downwardly tapering or wedge-like in shape and is also undercut or dovetailed. The wedgeshape socket of said plate I) is intended to re ceive a correspondingly-shaped head 0 on one end of a bracket-arm 0, whereby to detachably support said arm, the latter being curved or bent, so that when thus supported it will extend outwardly from the said side of the casing to first in a forwardly-oblique direction for a portion of its length and then straight out from said side at right angles thereto for the remainder of its length, as will be evident from an inspection of Figs. 2 and 3, which illustrate the shape of said arm. The said bracket-arm is circular in cross-section. On the outer or free end of said bracket-arm cis mounted a tablet-holder B, comprising two Serial No. 103,345. (No model.)

superposed plates or boards-first, a baseboard (Z, to whose lower face is secured a clamp 6, having a transverse opening, so that it may be slipped over said bracketarm,and also having a set-screw a, so that it may be secured to said arm to hold the base-board at various inclinations, and, second, an upper board f, which is pivotally connected at one edge to the edge of the base-board d by means of hinges g, as shown.

The adjacent faces of the two boards d and f are provided with two recesses cl f, (indicated by dotted lines in Fig. 2,) and two coilsprings 7b, one of which is illustrated in Fig. 2 and both of which are shown by dotted lines in Fig. 3, are interposed between said two boards with their ends received in said recesses, and said springs have a tendency to press the free end of the upper board f upwardly away from the base-board d.

Rigidly secured to one edge of the baseboard (Z, as illustrated in Figs. 2 and 3, is a clip Z, extending upwardly from said edge and having a downwardly-curved upper end Z, whose edge is inclined outwardly, as indicated at Z Fig. 5, and takes over the free edge of the pivoted and spring-pressed upper board f, which latter is pressed toward the said end of the clip, whereby to clamp a writing-tablet or loose memorandum-leaves m against the edge of the clip.

A person using the telephone as he has one of his hands, usually the left, employed with holding the receiver is at a disadvantage in manipulating a tablet or pad to take down any orders or the like; but with the device of my invention one hand alone is sufiicient to manipulate the pad, because the one disengaged hand can press the pivoted upper board downwardly and slip the pad or tablet underneath the edge of the clip, and then by releasing the pressure from the said board the latter will automatically spring upwardly and clamp the pad against the clip. After one sheet of the pad has been used up it may be torn off by one hand along the line of the edge of the clip to expose the sheet underneath it, and so on until the pad shall have been used up.

As is well known, after several sheets of a pad have been torn off along the line of a clip holding them those portions of the sheets remaining within the line of tearing will usually present a jagged outline, thereby hindering the tearing off of the other sheets, and for this reason the edge Z of the chip Z is bent outwardly, as best shown in Fig. 5, which I have found obviates the difficulty just described, because it tends to allow the remaining pieces or sections of the sheets that have been torn off to slip upwardly within the curved-over portion of the clip and become entirely disengaged from the clip.

The tablet-holder and its bracket-arm may be readily detached from the telephone-case 0 whenever desired, and the tablet-holder may be tilted to any desired inclination on its bracket-arm to suit the person desiring to use it.

The coil-springs h are of suflicient tension to resist the ordinary pressure of pen or pencil in writing; but at the same time the board may be readily pressed down to admit of the slipping of a pad or single sheet under the clip.

Having thus described my invention, what I claim as new, and desire to secure by Letters Patent, is

A memorandum-holder comprising a baseboard whose top surface near one end is provided with recesses arranged at opposite sides of said board and equally distant from said end; a plate hinged to said base-board at the end farthest from said recesses and provided on its bottom near its free end with recesses which confront and register with the recesses in the top surface of the base-board; coiled springs each having one end seated in one of the recesses in the base-board and their other ends taking in one of the confronting recesses in the hinged plate and adapted to keep the free end of said plate elevated from said baseboard, and a rigid clip-plate having a flange which takes beneath the base-board and which extends upwardly in front of and closes the space between the base-board and the free end of the hinged plate, said clip-plate also having a downwardly-curved upper end which engages the top surface of the hinged plate and forms a stop to prevent the springs from becoming dislodged from the recesses and also serves to clip the memorandum-sheets to hold the same in place on the hinged plate.

In testimony whereof I afHX my signature in the presence of two witnesses.

ORIN G. BYERS.

Witnesses:

CHARLES L. VIETSCH, FREDERICK S. STITT. 

